R.I.P. Buddy Roemer’s Presidential Campaign: ?–2012

Buddy Roemer, the former Republican presidential candidate, is now a former Reform Party presidential candidate, too. The ex-Louisiana governor officially conceded his obscure run for our nation’s highest office today.

The impetus for his bid’s end is, to be fair, less surprising than the news Buddy Roemer was still running in the first place. The Hill reports: “He failed to qualify for the November ballot in any of the 50 states, and cited that as his reason for dropping out of the race.” Yikes. In some of America’s lesser states, it’s not that difficult to get on the ballot: in North Dakota, for instance, candidates need only 4,000 signatures to do so. It seems Buddy Roemer should have been able to get at least that many from people who just saw his name and figured he must be some sort of celebrated professional golfer or kindly old lemonade magnate.

It’s too bad. We liked Roemer, as we remember reading back in March 2011 that while governor, he was known for “having staffers wear rubber bands on their arms and slapping them if they thought negative things,” like some insane chimera of George Orwell and William Faulkner characters.

Now just one man stands in the way of Romney’s path to the presidency: Barack Obama. And if we’re counting androids, two men: Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.